conditioning

[kuhn-dish-uh-ning]

noun

Psychology.

1. Also called operant conditioning, instrumental conditioning. a process of changing behavior by rewarding or punishing a subject each time an action is performed until the subject associates the action with pleasure or distress.

2. Also called classical conditioning, Pavlovian conditioning, respondent conditioning. a process in which a stimulus that was previously neutral, as the sound of a bell, comes to evoke a particular response, as salivation, by being repeatedly paired with another stimulus that normally evokes the response, as the taste of food.

conditioning

1. See classical conditioning

Other Word Forms

• self-conditioning adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of conditioning¹

First recorded in 1915–20; condition + -ing ¹

Example Sentences

Sun belt nations - including much of Asia, Africa, and Latin America - need large amounts of electricity for daytime air conditioning.

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California and other Democratic-led states sued again, arguing this week that the shifting of funds was nothing more than the administration circumventing the court’s earlier ruling against the conditioning of funds outright.

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Kram wrote that there was no air conditioning and “not a whisper of wind coming off the South China Sea.”

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Other workplace issues frame the union fight ahead, such as a properly functioning air conditioning system coming off the heels of a sweltering summer when people crowded the store to peruse its products.

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Other judges have also ruled against the administration conditioning disaster and public safety funding on states and localities complying with federal immigration policies.

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Related Words

• assignment 
• discipline 
• drilling 
• homework 
• preparation 
• repetition 
• training 
• tryout 
• warmup 
• workout